Rollover Drill

“Scoggins, Get out of the damn truck!”
PVT Cooley, gunner in the HMMWV (Hum-v) during rollover drills, after being told that gunners are the last to exit the vehicle.

PTSD creeps up on you slowly. Well it did for me anyway. It felt like a wet blanket was put over your body and everything just kind of slowed down. One day things are fine and the next feels like your life is out of control. I feel like I am cheating . Maybe I am not really entitled to have PTSD. After all I wasn’t kicking in doors or watching my friends getting hit with VBIED’s like some of the guys I know. I had my share of close calls and that was enough for me. But why is it that some people can have a world of shit dumped on them and walk away eating ice cream, and others react like they just walked out of the Ardennes forest after the Battle of the Bulge? People have different reactions to the stress they experience. Some, like PVT Colley react strongly in a training environment. Almost to the point of panic. The HMMWV rollover drill consists of 5 soldiers getting into a HMMWV simulator, strapping into the seatbelts and getting flipped 2-3 times to disorient you. You are left inverted 180 degrees (read, you’re upside down). You are then required to unhook from the seat and exit the vehicle. Not a very tough thing to do in training. There is no blast, no debris being thrown into the crew compartment, no screaming. Just unhook and get out. My platoon got through the drill with no incidents until the last group got hooked up. PVT Colley is a small female. She has had a sheltered life for the most part. She Joined the Army at age 18 and deployed to Iraq 9 months later. As she was getting into the vehicle, you could tell that she was not up for it. She was shaking. And as the simulator started its rotation her screaming got louder. She was begging us to let her out. Most of us were laughing pretty hard. I admit I was laughing as well. Soldiers have a very morbid sense of humor. As the simulator came to a stop, I could see the rubber ducks (rubber weapons used in training) bouncing around the inside compartment. This is an indication that people weren’t doing as they were supposed to. You are told to hold onto the rifle with your legs. If the rifles are bouncing around the crew compartment things went wrong inside. As the command to egress the vehicle came, I could hear soldiers falling out of their seats as they unhook. PVT Colley, who was in the gunners turret, starts to move her way to the rear door to get out. She is obviously scared and just wants to end this drill. She reaches the door and as she is getting ready to exit the instructor tells her that as the gunner she is the last to leave. The look of shock on her face was indescribable. She turned back into the truck and not knowing what else to do, started screaming at SPC Scoggins. “Scoggins, get out of the damn truck” At the time this was the funniest thing I had heard in a long time. It was classic. It summed up the day. But now, looking back and thinking about my dealings with PTSD and stress I see how terrified she must have been stuck inside that overturned vehicle. Why was this so horrifying for her?

Originally wrote the day I left

2009 July 12
On the way to Iraq today.

We start the day early, 0500 wake up. The last day in my “house”. So long Germany for the next year. I got up early just to finish off the packing of last minute items and to put items into my storage box. My buddy SSG Johnson has said that I may store a few items in his storage room in the basement of his housing. Being as this is my third time into Iraq this deployment doesn’t have the feel of the others. I am not concerned about the idea of IED’s and stray bullets this time. This deployment feels more like a field exercise then a war.
So we get uploaded onto the busses with no problems and are on our way to a holding area prior to going to Rammstein Airbase for the flight to Kuwait. At the holding area we are manifested into the system showing that we are going where we are supposed to be. I silently prayed my manifest was going to say The Bahamas. But it didn’t. Well 4 and a half hours at the “Purple Ramp”, 1 box lunch of chicken pasta, and a good long discussion with my Commander about the beautiful city of Fallujah and the start of PTSD later, we depart for Rammstein. At Rammstein, we wait on the hot humid bus for about 30 min while they rouse the Air Force out of bed and fuel our aircraft. Then off into the wild blue yonder to Kuwait City.
Kuwait is not as hot this time as I remember it being. I guess 110 at 2 AM grows on you with time. However I find that you never get used to having sand blown into your face like I was in a sandblasting spa from hell. I console myself with the thought that people (rich people with no sense) pay very good money to have this done to them. They call it exfoliating, I call it stupid. Well Camp Buehring has certainly grown into a small city over the past 6 years. My first time through here was an experience that the Nazi’s would have been proud of. No amenities to speak of. No cold water, no cold air, no warm food. Now with the passage of time we have a 24 KFC, Green bean coffee house, Movie Theater a PX with more to choose from than the one in Mannheim. We have classes coming up on Escalation of Force, Rollover training (How to egress a rolled over vehicle. I am sure you can guess why we need to know this), Close Quarter training (How to clear a building of bad guys), ROE (Rules of Engagement). All of this and more over the course of the next few weeks.

I am looking forward to getting into Iraq. I know it sounds strange but its true. The first time I was called up to deploy I broke the news to my parents. My mom couldn’t understand why I would want to go off to fight a war. I told her that to me it was like suiting up on a football team just to sit on the bench for the last 15 years. Well now I get to play in the big game and that is something that I have always wanted to do. Well it still feels that way to me. Anyway, I am looking forward to getting this mission going. Sitting around in Kuwait really bites. Time to go play Army.
Ok I am going to add what I am calling “Army Quote Of The Day”. I will add quotes that I pick up throughout the days here. I am trying to make this a funny quote to kind of lighten up the day. Todays quote is…
“That runway looks a bit… Lumpy”
SPC Kidd on seeing the Rammstein runway for the first time.

Batt out.

New Tattoo

Well Here I am again. This time I have new ink. I thought it was time to get some tattoo work done prior to deploying. I always say there is nothing like going to combat with new tattoos. My wife originally found this picture when I was stationed in Germany the first time. We both really liked the way it looked and my wife suggested I think about getting it as a tattoo one day. well 7-8 years later that day has come.

Here is a picture of the original art. It was done by a man named Gil Elvgren. Here is a little background on Mr. Elvgren...

Gillette A. Elvgren was born on the 15th March 1914, in St. Paul, Minnesota. He started at the Minnesota Art Institute studying architecture but soon realised that he loved painting more, for this reason he moved to Chicago with his young wife to study at the American Academy of Art. After graduation he found work at Stevens and Gross, a prestigious advertising agency, working under Haddon Sundblom (famous for his Coca Cola Santas).

Elvgren started producing pin-up girls in 1937 for the publishing company Louis F. Dow, however in 1944 he moved to Brown and Bigelow who offered $1000 per pin-up, substantially more than he was getting at Dow. His contract specified between 18 and 20 pin-ups per year, and only for Brown and Bigelow. However Elvgren soon branched out into other forms of commercial art, amongst them adverts for Coca Cola, Ovaltine and others.

http://www.btinternet.com/~brmerc/elvgren/elvgren.html

So without any further ado, here is the original..

And here is the tattoo.

Thanks to Joy for all the hjard work you put in to this for me. I really do love it. And I am not mad at you for trying to destroy my leg that last hour. LOL. Seriously I do appreciate it. Thanks.

Getting closer

So. We are now a few weeks out from leaving for the big desert. I am looking forward to getting over there and getting this shindig started. This will be my third (3rd) trip to Iraq and its sorry to say but it gets easier the more often I have to do it. For those who dont know, I have been serving in the United States Army for the last 17.5 years. I am on active duty and I am in the Signal Corp. I currently work with the AN/TRC-170(V)2 Tropospheric Scatter Microwave Radio Terminal.



These things are pretty impressive. They can transmit a 2000 watt signal well over 100-150 miles. They put out enough power from the antennae on the front to cook popcorn (true story).

Here is a picture of some of the equipment I will be bringing.


M4 Rifle.
IOTV (Improved Outer Tactical Vest) Body armor
XBOX 360 (not shown).

More to follow.

Batt Out.